Calico Beans
Fry up the bacon, ground beef and onion in a large skillet. Drain. Mix with the rest of ingredients. Stir well. Pour into a covered casserole dish and bake at 350º for 55-60 min.
So I have been seeing a lot of neat recipes floating around on facebook lately and you know me, I HAVE to try it at least once if it looks good and isn’t too dependent on processed foods. So here is my:
Strawberry-Banana Oatmeal Smoothie
In blender add your oats and chia seeds. Blend on high until texture of flour. Add milk and juice to blender and blend well making sure to get the oats and chia up into the mixture with a spoon or spatula. Add yogurt and blend. Add strawberries and bananas, then blend. Add vanilla and honey and blend on high until desired smoothness is obtained. Transfer into jar and refrigerate overnight. Will keep in fridge for 2-3 days. Shake before drinking.
I originally found the recipe for this bread here. I made a few adjustments, but either recipe is really good!
Applesauce Bread
Mix dry ingredients in a mixing bowl, make a pit in center, add rest of ingredients, mix well, pour into a buttered bread pan. Bake at 350º for 45-55 min. or until toothpick comes out clean.
OR you can make this version, which is more applesauce(y) and has more cinnamon and no nutmeg:
This yields an even more moist loaf 😉
I have seen all these really cool drink ideas and I was like…. I … want….to …..go…. to…. there….!!!! Sorry, television program reference. Anyway, this is my take on making these drinks; since they are super healthy and I want them to be available to my kids whenever they are thirsty for ‘more than water’ I bought a 3 gallon drink dispenser to sit on the counter. This way they can have one of these super healthy ‘waters’ whenever they want and it’s super convenient for them. I put the jug in the fridge at night and out on the counter during the day. There is a nifty little core in the middle that you keep filled with ice to keep your drink cold. Our first one:
Blackberry-Sage Antioxidant Water
Combine ingredients. Sit in fridge over night, can keep adding water as it gets low and drink out of it for the next 48 hours. Then discard fruit and leaves and start over. I made this recipe x3 for my family.
PS-That handsome fellow in the background is my youngest cutting up our zucchini for dinner.
Parmesan Crusted Zucchini
Cut zucchini into 1/4 inch slices. Toss with oil. In separate bowl combine pepper, salt, panko and parmesan. Pat each side of zucchini into panko mixture. Lay zucchini slices out flat on a greased cookie sheet and bake at 400º for 25 min.
I hade been making this recipe for Breakfast Cake quite some time now, so I was very excited to try this recipe for Breakfast Cake Muffins when she came out with it. I usually use the ENTIRE bag of chocolate chips though not the 1/2 cup she calls for 🙂
Breakfast Cake Muffins
Stir together flour, oats, salt and baking soda. Add butter, milk, honey, eggs and vanilla. Fold in chocolate chips. Spoon batter into 12 buttered muffin tins. Bake at 350 in the oven for 20-25 min.
Pulled Pork w/ Homemade BBQ Sauce
Cook your pork in a crock pot with the seasonings. Add water and cook on high for 2 hours and low for 3, or until pork is tender and falls apart easy. Remove pork and sit aside, dump out the juices from cooking the pork. Pull the pork apart and return to crock pot. Add Homemade BBQ Recipe x3. Stir and cook on low in crock pot for 30 min.
Hey, I like pancakes and sausage, why not make them together in an easy and convenient muffin??? You can eat this just as they are, or like I did with real maple syrup. I found this recipe here.
Pancake and Sausage Muffins
Mix dry ingredients first, then add milk, eggs and butter, stir in the sausage last. Pour into buttered muffin tins. Makes about 18 muffins. Bake at 350º for 15-20 min.
A lot of people have asked why I mill my own wheat. Here is my best answer: Wheat begins an oxidation process once the berry has been broken. Oxidation breaks down and destroys the nutrients in the wheat, so you lose it’s nutritional value after a certain period of time. To receive full benefit of the flour, you have to bake with it fairly quickly, within the first day or two is highly recommended. Fresh Milled flour still has all the parts to it that the traditional processing of store bought flours strip from it. For instance, the oils and wheat germ make the flour go rancid after a while, so to boost shelf life they remove these things in the processing of the wheat but in doing so, we are loosing most of the nutrients, not to mention the fact that having the whole part of the wheat berry present during digestion can decrease adverse reactions to wheat because it works together as a whole.
Now if you notice some flour companies will ‘enrich’ their bread to make it seem more nutritious, but it’s just a feeble attempt to synthetically add back some of what they have taken, not really adding back any benefit really. So for me, milling is just the better choice. I know it’s not for everyone, but it IS for me 🙂
**edited to add this link, it’s just another neat breakdown of why she mills her wheat and I thought it was interesting, you might too.
Honey Sugar Scrub
Combine all ingredients, store in a lidded container in bathroom, or better yet right in the shower where you can reach lol.
Homemaker Gone Natural 